'Black' Ads Under Fire

June 24, 1987|By Lisanne Renner of The Sentinel Staff

The June issue of Ebony magazine is fattened with 16 pages of cigarette and alcohol ads -- ads that portray blacks as successful law students, glamorous highlifers, victorious basketball players. The Philip Morris Companies bought a two-page spread to display the work of a black, Pulitzer- Prize winning photojournalist. An ad for Mumm Cognac announces a corporate contribution to the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame.

Beyond magazine pages -- on inner-city billboards, on the sides of buses, on radio stations -- blacks are invited to enjoy a can of malt liquor or savor a menthol cigarette. Alcohol and tobacco companies develop name recognition and goodwill among blacks by sponsoring such activities as street festivals in black neighborhoods, sports carnivals at black universities and scholarships for black students. They also donate hefty chunks of money to such organizations as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the National Urban League and the United Negro College Fund.

The promotions seem admirable and the donations laudable, but several health-oriented organizations aren't offering any congratulatory toasts. As part of broader efforts to squelch cigarette and alcohol promotions in general, these groups are attacking ads that target blacks, who suffer disproportionately from illnesses and deaths related to smoking and alcohol abuse. They are also criticizing black organizations for accepting donations from the cigarette and alcohol industries.

Alcohol ads and promotional events that court blacks are ''exploitive and hypocritical'' and ''contribute to alcohol abuse among black Americans,'' charges a recent report by the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a non-profit organization focusing on public health policies.

Ditto for cigarette ads. ''I'm not saying that Ebony's cigarette ads are worse than cigarette ads in Time -- cigarettes are equal-opportunity killers,'' said Alan Blum, a family physician in Houston who founded Doctors Ought to Care in 1977. ''But it's all the more tragic when smoking has a disproportionate health effect on blacks . . . and there is this incredible silence on the part of black organizations.''

Fewer adults smoke cigarettes today than at any time since the 1950s. The decline has happened in every age group and at every income level, but it has been greatest among the better educated and among those with higher incomes. As smokers, blacks have been slower to kick the habit than the rest of the population. According to the National Center for Health Statistics, nearly 41 percent of all black men smoke, compared with 32 percent of all white men. Among women, 32 percent of blacks smoke compared with nearly 28 percent of whites. Blacks also have the country's highest rates of lung cancer and coronary heart disease, both linked to smoking.

Alcohol abuse has been deemed the leading health and safety problem in black America by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. It's a problem even though blacks drink less, per person, than whites.

The rates of cirrhosis of the liver and esophageal cancer -- both associated with alcohol -- ''exceed greatly the rates at which whites suffer these diseases,'' according to the report by the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

Critics of cigarette and alcohol ads contend that major black organizations have not objected to such ads and promotional events because the organizations are reluctant to alienate industries that are major contributors.

However, the National Urban League -- one of several organizations receiving substantial donations from the tobacco and alcohol industries -- says it has no qualms about advertising aimed at blacks or about accepting donations from industries that are, after all, legal. League spokesman Clarence Wood makes an analogy between alcohol, cigarettes and salt: Salt contributes to hypertension -- a major health problem among blacks -- but the National Urban League has no objection to salt ads.

Wood also sees no validity in the allegations that criticism of such ads has been quelled by contributions to black organizations from the tobacco and alcohol industries. Such donations are simply one way that corporations are supporting the league's civil rights mission, said Wood.

The practice of tailoring ads to a specific market is called ''segmentation,'' and it is done not just with cigarettes and alcohol but with products as innocuous as hamburgers and shoes. Black-owned ad agencies are often hired to design ad campaigns directed at blacks.